The value of personalized information delivery has not been lost on the Internet’s first full-service bank, Security First Network Bank. They have elected to use investment information as their first outbound messaging service. This fits their strategy of developing a platform for resale to other financial institutions that supports all financial services from checking to credit to insurance to securities trading.

But unless you have a strong brokerage and/or mutual fund department, you probably don’t want to get involved with investment information services right away. The major discount brokerages such as Schwab, start-up Web-based firms such as PC Quote, and most recently Microsoft, are chasing this niche with a vengeance. Let them fight that battle while you concentrate on outbound transaction account info.

Portfolio Tracking Services
SFNB has contracted with MacroWorld to provide quotes, portfolio tracking and investment-oriented news services. The free service is available to SFNB customers (and anyone else right now) via links from its Web <www.sfnb.com>. We recently tested the service with a fictitious portfolio of online banking companies (screenshot right) and found it very easy to set up and use. We especially liked the option to have portfolio values e-mailed on a daily or weekly basis (see next page). Alerts could be programmed with a few keystrokes to provide a heads-up whenever price or activity reached predefined thresholds. The only drawback is that you have to log-on or wait for an end-of-day e-mail to see the alert notice./p>

SFNB allows users to choose e-mail delivery of portfolio values on a daily or weekly basis.

The SFNB tracking services should appeal to the casual trader who likes to follow certain stocks but doesn’t have the time to go online and access quotes each day. Unfortunately, SFNB got a little carried away with some of the information provided. I question the need or desirability of providing bank customers (or anyone) with market timing advice. Leave that mumbo jumbo to the professional traders and stock speculators. Those people won’t be looking to a depository institution for investment information anyway. For the average bank customer, it’s confusing, frustrating, if not borderline misleading, to receive indecipherable investment advice.